The outgoing Chief Executive of Highways England has admitted the organisation could have done a better job of introducing smart motorways.

In an interview with Highways News to be published in full next week, Mr O’Sullivan told site co-owner Adrian Tatum things “could have been done differently” over the way the organisation communicated the concept around smart motorways.

“The smart motorway communications could have been better,” he said. “There was too much on the new technology and perhaps we should have has a clearer, simple message for drivers instead.”

However he does point out that Highways England has invested £5m in communications as part of RIS2 to address that.

He also admits to being frustrated when “everyone focuses on smart motorways”. He told Tatum, “Every death or injury on a motorway is a tragedy and we need to keep on finding ways to improve this as a priority but there are around 1,500 deaths on other roads in the UK every year compared to eight or nine on smart motorways and I think it is just as important we (as a nation) do more about that also.”

The full interview will be published on Tuesday 15th September.